Sunday 15 May 2016

Passion… Plus Marathon Running, Stewy's Surgery, Girls Weekend, Farm Life

Over the last several months the idea of passion has come up so many times in my conversations and thoughts that I just can't ignore it anymore.

Sometimes fate draws us to something or someone that we need as part of our journey through this lifetime to take us to a higher existence.   Sometimes we are lucky enough to understand these chance meetings or long term relationships.   Sometimes we don't understand their significance until much later.   Sometimes we never know.   Sometimes it's a teacher.  A Coach.   A like minded person that shares something of interest.   Sometimes it's a non human companion.  Sometimes it's the other half of a bad relationship.   A bully.   A co-worker that never stops complaining.   A circumstance you find yourself in that you need to make a choice.  A choice to be a priority and not an option.   

It's a knowledge, that you have this one life and that you better live it while you have it.  It's a fire that burns from within us.  It's a stubborn fire that sits in wait for the right opportunity.  It's silent...waiting.  Even if it's unwanted...it will eventually stir within us and we won't be able to stop it.   It speaks to us.   It will guide us.  It will eventually rule us and we will obey.   Because we have no choice or because we have made a choice that passion is more powerful than the existence we already know.   That we must throw ourselves blindly into the wind because to not know passion is to have not loved with abandon.   It will get us lost so that we can find ourselves.   Passion is what makes love last.   It's what we suffer for because it's worth the risk and we would rather kill ourselves trying than to never find out if we could.   It's the passion and satisfaction that lasts when happiness fades or the happiness gets too tough to maintain.   It's the long term connection we have to what's inside us that lights our fire.   It's the reason we get up in the morning and the reason we fall into bed exhausted.    

When it's not the reason; these are the saddest of people.  They have yet to know the depth of their life's meaning.   The purpose they have on this journey.   I truly feel sorry for these people because this is the consolation prize of just sex without love.   When we don't know what our passion is...we don't know ourselves in our finest form.   Without passion we don't know the depth of love.   The fierceness of anger.  The emptiness of grief or the clarity of hatred.   Without passion for someone, something or some cause, we live a life with borders.   Our cup never run-ith over; our souls never shine from our hearts with the joy of knowing we made a choice to be a victor.   Because suffering as a victim or suffering as a victor are not the same.   Without passion we live half a life, content but flat.  Once we discover what we are willing to pay a price for; we have found our passion, our mission, our purpose.   Surely, the feeling of existence beyond ones self can't be just contained within me.....


Marathon
I personally became a passion victor this month.  :-)  On my 43rd Birthday I ran my first marathon.  42.2K on a cold rainy day.   There were high and low emotions.  There was some significant suffering to finish that race but some considerable joy in the realization that ones mind and body can be pushed beyond previously known limits.    
I maintained a 6:18 pace for the distance in the 6C rain for 4 hours and 29 minutes.   The last 5K had a strong headwind.  Rain was in our faces and there was a small hill in the last 3K that felt like Everest.    But I crossed that finish line and I knew I had made it!   All the hours of training had got me to a goal.   It wasn't something that anyone could give to me it had to be earned.   I had to do it on my own.   No one could hand over a marathon to me.    There was no entitlement.   Everyone that crossed that line that day had to earn it and had to have enough passion burning in their bellies to move their feet.   I had made it under my goal time and I had finished a race that created a check on my bucket list.   I am proud of this goal accomplished.   I am proud of the fact that I am one of the stats that makes up less than 0.5% of Canadians that have completed a marathon. 
 Theresa and I at the finish gate as we both hugged and held back tears!


Theresa, Mel and I also all ran the Mercedes 10K in Oakville.  We all posted PB 10K times!!

Horses
The farm seen Dr Tom out for routine vaccinations this month.   All were grand troopers.
Stewy has since been gelded and had a minor surgery on his hock at Milton Equine Hospital.   He is now on stall rest for 6 weeks!   Eek that should be fun with the little monster!   So far he's been a decent patient.  DH and I created a temporary outdoor stall in the old run-in shelter so he can have visitors and also look out over the farm fields.


Erla has been progressing in her training with wonderful ease.   We are learning each other a little more every day.  
We have been practising self loading on the trailer and she's doing fantastic! 


Girls Weekend
Every year the girls I went to grade school and high school with get together to share space and company.
This year Sheri opened up her home for us and we had a fabulous weekend together.   
These women are the tribe of women I will grow old with.   They are the women who know my history and who share wisdom of years of knowing each other.   These friendships are ones that cannot be replaced with new friends because the history we share together is what connects us.   These women are my clan.   My family.  My strength.


Farm
The farm has seen the lush grass of spring sprout and the horses filling up on the their first turnout.

The first Trilliums bloom in the woods.

This beautiful sunrise...

The Killdeer's are also back in 3 locations this year.   This one is on the driveway rounding the bend to the house.



The two most important days in your life are the day you are born and they day you find out why. - Mark Twain